Brand New Life?

Last Friday my kid Aaron graduated from Universal Technical Institute in Sacramento, a huge accomplishment.  Anthony and I both attended as the proud parents…Loved it.  Sunday, we moved Aaron and his girlfriend, Christine, one dog, 2 cats, 5 newborn kittens, a snake and a hamster back here to Bishop.  This is a touchy affair, to say the least…Now I adore my boy, and Christine is a doll, but now we are 4 adults and far too many animals in one place!!

At least that’s my take on it today.  Aaron is now a certified Smog Technician, so hopefully he’ll find work here, although I worry because Bishop is so small.  But he graduated at the top of his class, if that means anything.

Anyhoo, I just thought I’d check in today.

This sounds so damnably negative.  That’s not what I mean to imply, but a blog is a blog is a blog.  I think my biggest concern is that Anthony and I have become very used to being ‘just us’ for a year and a half, and this is huge.  I have to set some boundaries so that I don’t feel used.

I hope my worries written here are simply adjustment pains!

Here I am Again…

Well, well, it’s been awhile.  I pretty much gave up on WordPress when my browser wouldn’t support it, but Firefox allows me access.  I’ve also been trying to write on HubPages.  Unfortunately, once you commit to a title, that’s it.  Well, actually, you have 24 hours to delete the thing, but sometimes my titles come as I am writing a piece, not before.

I’ve met some extremely supportive people over there and hope to continue, though the focus seems to be on article-writing, and I tend to write in a journalistic fashion.  Here I feel much more relaxed writing, for each of your ‘Hubs’ are scored, as are you.  The developers of the site claim that there is some sort of algorithmic formula that determines these scores, and they fluctuate daily.  It can be disconcerting, and I was told straightforwardly by my therapist to cease and desist my membership on HubPages because of my problematic self-esteem.  She may be right, but I’m not one to follow directions.  My ‘Hubber Score’ varies between 90 and 97-out of 100-so I am fairly pleased with that!

My son, Aaron, graduates from UTI next week.  He is a young man I can hardly believe that I raised.  He is serious, determined, goal-oriented-all in all, one hell of a guy.  While his parents went galavanting through drugs and alcohol, Aaron managed to become a fabulous young man.  I am so incredibly proud, I can barely contain myself.  Anthony and I will drive up to Sacramento for the graduation ceremony-with Aaron at the top of his class.  Wow.

Thing is, though, Aaron wants to return to Bishop to live, so he and his girlfriend, Christine, are moving in with us until they find a place of their own.  Anthony and I have been living without Aaron for over a year now and we have settled in to quite a routine.  I am happy to have them-as well as their1 dog, 2 cats, and 5 kittens-but am apprehensive how this will all work out.

Well, I have to go now, I’ll try to get back here sooner…

 

It was a Shitty Day…

Sounds like Simon and Garfunkel.  Well, I am feeling low as a skunk, smelly as a snake.  Jeeze, I went to my surgeon today and decided to schedule surgery for my other hip in February ’10.  I actually don’t know how I really feel about it, I know what’s coming, have faith in the doctor, but still…sheeit.

It hurts like hell now, so I suppose it’s time to go ahead and do this thing.  Why wait until I can barely walk?  I have to quit smoking again, I am not sure how easy it will be this time.

Birthday’s been ‘down’ for 3 days now, he’s one of our dogs.  He’s our favorite dog.  He is around 12 and has seizures, then goes ‘down,’ in that he can hardly move.  Tonight Anthony spoke kind of sternly to Birthday, and he responded, got up and went outside.  We’ll see what happens in the morning.

You know what?  This is what I really want my blog to be-a diary, a notepad where I can just ramble and not worry about judgement or length or any damned thing.

Later,

L

Some Thoughts on H1N1

I have been tending to Anthony, my husband, since last Tuesday when we went to the ER.  The diagnosis, the Swine Flu.  Now while I have nothing but respect for the medical profession, I was almost speechless at the way this ‘diagnosis’ came to be.  He had been feeling ‘run down’ since the Friday before-an uncharacteristic phrase for him to use, to say the least.  But he doggedly went to work and just did not seem himself when he returned home.  That Tuesday he phoned me to let me in on a little tidbit, “I coughed up blood in my workmask!”-as if this was a quite clever aside.  Men.

Anyhow, long blog short, he came home from work, and did not want to go to the hospital, claiming the blood was now from a nosebleed.  Uh huh.  I went on with my evening as if nothing was wrong, and went to bed.  Within an hour he woke me and told me it was ‘time.’  I knew he would, I just had to let him figure it out on his own.  Thank God.

So anyhow, when we got there, the ER entrance had stands in front containing gloves, masks, and sanitary wipes for all to use.  We did, and he was triaged in 30 minutes.  Once inside the exam room, the nurse entered with 2 H1N1 pamphlets, one from the CDC and one from the Health Dep’t.

Now Anthony had not yet been seen by the doctor, and from all of my research, the symptoms are virtually the same.  How on earth are H1N1 statistics kept properly if assumption is their only diagnostic tool?  Testing is performed only on those in high-risk groups or those whose symptoms are so severe that they need hospitalization.

I get that there are sample tests out there-percentages being tested and all-but pure numbers are impossible to report.

But hey, what do I know?  :o)

Eastern Sierra Days

When living in such a rural place as Bishop, there are some things you have to put up with.  Yes, it is a glorious place, but human beings seem determined to mess with it’s resources.  Although I don’t know the entire story, I do know that this area used to be full of lakes, trees and lush greenery.  That was before Los Angeles-Mr. Mulholland and his co-horts, actually-began draining the water from the Owens Valley.  After 70 years or so, we live in the thirsty aridity that they left behind.  It is a desert throughout most of Inyo county which Hollywood has seen as perfect for filming old dusty Westerns.  Hooray for Hollywood!  Bitter?  Who me?

My family and I chose Bishop in order to raise our son in relative safety.  Which we did, and quite handily, I might add.  The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power left untouched many creeks and streams, and not too far away, rivers and mountains where we took him as a boy.  But they did drain the Owens Lake, south of Bishop, which they are graciously ‘re-working’ these days after residents and neighbors elsewhere in the Valley complained of the monstrous eyesore and pollution due to the constantly moving dust.  Small towns dot Highway 395 all the way up California:  Lone Pine, Independence, Big Pine, Bishop, and so on northward through Oregon.  But in my vicinity, picture if you will a vast desert with greenery only every 50 miles or so.  It’s a grim, hot drive.

All in all, though, I love living here for this town’s proximity to so many lovely sights and adventures.  We have lived here 15 years and have no plans of scurrying off any time soon.  My hope is that I will move north one day, perhaps after 10 or so years, when I grow tired of the coyote’s songs.

Beginning of the End of an Era

I just heard the news that Susan Atkins, one of Charles Manson’s followers has died of brain cancer.  I understand that she was denied parole earlier this month which dashed her desire to return home to die.  While I feel sorrow for her and her biological family, I have little pity for this woman who, as I remember, was the most vicious of the ‘girls’ who butchered so many people in 1969.  Atkins was the member of the ‘Manson Family’ who cut the 8 month old baby from Sharon Tate’s belly.  I didn’t live far from the site of the “Tate Murders”, and remember as a 12 year old child the strange and paranoid sense of impossibility that held us all.  Of course, that was then, and so on.  Today such a brutal rampage would attract little attention, if any.  These insane behaviors seem to happen every other day in our new world.  The world has become disturbingly immune since that horrible event 40 years ago, which troubles me.  The late 50′s and most of the 60′s ushered in a major change in societal consciousness: the Vietnam War, the Beat Generation and their poetic meanderings, political and racial assassinations, rock and roller overdoses, the accessibility of television to (virtually) all, drugs, Hippies, and a burgeoning sense of global belonging and responsibility.

And L.A. was a city undergoing changes, admittedly, but during those 20 years it was still a relatively safe place to live and raise a family.  At least until the Tate-LaBianca killings, that is.  Perhaps it was the media attention that made everything seem so frightening, the body counts from the war reported daily on the national newscasts were particularly chilling.  For a child coming to grips with the world at this time, it was all, well, too much.  I remember Halloween that year, not longer than 2 months after the slaughters, was subdued.  My mother served hot apple cider on our front porch and I was told to “…keep [my] trick-or-treating to one block,” with my best friend in tow “at all times…”  Yes, Mama.  And I did.  Where the Halloweens of years past were times of freedom and childhood pranks, that one was bleak, even given my measly boundary limits.

So yes, it’s a pity that she had to meet with such a sorry end, but I find myself blaming people like Atkins with my cautiously ‘edited’ childhood.  Two months after the murders my mother shipped me off to boarding school 400 miles to the north.  To safety.

But that’s another story…

Eastern Sierra Nights

Late last night, I rose from my damnable tossing and turning, came out to my living room and slumped into my favorite easy chair.  Like harpies with PMS sniping at one another, my thoughts droned on incessantly.  I decided to shut them up by going outside for a smoke.  At least they might quiet down, who could tell?  After lighting up, peering into the starry sky, I stopped to take in the thunderous silence of this place, the Eastern Sierra.

Our home is in Bishop, California, at the foot of these stunning, rolling giants, and we are a small town of around 4,000 souls.  Bishop is the largest populated town you will find here in the Owens Valley, nestled comfortably between the Sierra Nevada range to the west and the Whites to the east.  This valley is spectacular as anyone can imagine, although the Whites have little of the Sierra’s majesty.  They have their own muted beauty that impresses on a much smaller scale.  Only a bit further toward the Pacific-2 1/2 hours by car during the warm seasons-lies Yosemite National Park, one of the places God has surely rested His hand.  I live in a wondrous place.

And then, so late into the night, my internal harpies were silenced by the quiet of the natural world.  Ribbons of smoke paused in the air and I put out the cigarette, ready to try again-to try and seduce that elusive sandman.  But as I began to move toward the door, I heard the coyotes.  I sat down to listen to their songs.  I have seen only one of these animals in my 15 years living in this area;  I watched,  breathless as it furtively and fearfully darted through alfalfa fields that cover the south side of town.  They are notoriously private creatures, these dogs, distrustful of man and his ambitions.  Oh, but their harmonies are incalculably beautiful, coyote choruses to be heard throughout the  night.  Their music is somehow ethereal and unreal, unlike their domesticated cousins’ frustrated and  fenced-in barks and yaps.

Mountain coyotes or desert, I heard them last night, then retired to my own silence-which finally, blessedly was mine.  They had sung me the sweetest lullaby I have ever heard.

Hips and Such

Well, people, I have been not too dependable as a blogger.  This may be because I have been trying too hard, or because the sun has been shining too brightly, or, well, you get the idea.  I don’t know what’s up with my writing but I have decided to try to put in at least 300 words per day.  This is a measly number, I realize, but I have read that this is a recommended minimum when writer’s block-or whatever-has reared its ugly head.  Pretty ugly, the thing.

So, here I go.  Hmm.  Well, let’s see.  I haven’t really talked much about my actual life, now have I?  I know that I mentioned my hip replacement surgery, didn’t I?   Well, I’ll have you know that the whole thing went fabulously, at least that’s what they tell me.  I certainly felt fabulous when I woke up with morphine coursing through my veins, well actually the surgeon inserted some sort of drug-delivery device in my spine which kept me flying for around 18 hours.  Nice.  I was awake within 3-4 hours and ready for a meal.  And boy, was I in a good mood.  I could not stop chattering every time a poor unsuspecting nurse entered my room.  They were appropriately kind and I guess they enjoyed some of my banter, for they gave me a get-well card when I was discharged.

Of course the needle madmen/women were at me every few hours, which I actually didn’t mind, not even one little bit, but when the physical therapist arrived, my sweetness and light turned to drudgery and pain!  I knew they were coming, and damn it, they did.  Oh, never believe the apparent benevolence on their professionally encouraging faces!

“And how are we feeling today, Ms. Rogers?  Ready to give it a try?”  They meant that walker I’d seen lurking on the other side of the room.  ”Of course,” I complained, thinking about the impossibility of moving my leg off the bed in the first place, much less walk on the poor thing.  Well, let me tell you, it was no walk in the park; actually it was a walk to the bathroom.   The indignity of using a walker-poorly-was just about more than I could stand.  But, whatcha gonna do?

Well, once we returned home my hubby ‘tricked out’ my walking aide, strapping on cup holders and a sort of satchel for my morning paper and other sundries.  Which proved invaluable-for one week!  Yes, at 52, age was finally an advantage, and I began lurching around the house on my own.  My animals were frozen in absolute terror most of the time, but I learned to veer somehow and  squashed nary a one!  My biggest challenge became regaining my grace. Yeah, right.  I kept telling myself to stop walking like a duck.  And, what do you know, my hubby told me just today that I walk just like I used to.

Fabulous all around.  And, hey, this post has more than 300 words.  Yeah for me!  I’ll banish the ugly thing one of these days.

Bye!

That Voice-Who Me?

Dear Readers,

I have been terribly tardy in blogging these days and want to offer an apology to those who happen by.  I’m sure I am not the only blogger on the planet to miss days or even weeks of posting, but I feel somewhat shabby about beginning with such enthusiasm and then, well, nothing.  So here are a few placations that I hope will soothe you savage yet literate beasts!

“Get on with it, then!”  says the voice, yes, the one referred to in the title.  It is insidious, the voice, and I have yet to identify it with precision.  So “that voice” is the subject of this post; perhaps an attempt at taking the thing down a notch.  Because, my friends, it is responsible for my silence, not I!  ”Hee hee,” said she…  If I had my druthers, I would wax endlessly about this and that, comment expertly on the latest agenda facing the Senate, and present my philosophical proofs with wit and elegance.  Ah, yes, those would be the days.

As it is, I live in this middle-aged head of mine and listen to the endless banter between conflicting selves that have grown up within me.  This is not news to anyone, no one that I know.  We are all at battle with our pasts.  Mine has combined into one personality all its own.  ”Grow Up!”  it commands, “That’s all over, why, those people are long dead, for God’s sake!”  Yes, I know this, I know it all too well, yet “that voice” is the only one I can unavoidably hear.  Particularly when I want to sit down and write.  When I neglect my blogging responsibilities, ‘she’ is to blame, you see, and all those voices do combine into a ‘she’ without a doubt.  Yep, she’s one hell of a bitch.  Now obviously I am being facetious, yet ‘that voice’ does seem a separate entity at times, yes?

She is  not kind.  She has no patience.  She is a modern-day battleaxe.  And her only project is little old me.  She is insufferable enough to wake me in the night to remind me of my interpersonal missteps of the day before, making sure that I am sufficiently aroused so I can’t go back to sleep for hours.  Her personal joy is in jabbing me in the side just as I have relaxed into writing confidence.  And of course, she makes absolutely sure I get a bruise.  I always do.

Okay, okay, I am not going to blame it all on that woman.  Although I should.  But how do I fight back?  What is this schizoid word processing that goes on in my brain?  Well, I suppose it comes down to a simple choice.  I either sit comatose in front of the waiting page, or I can have the courage to  meet it with the written word.  ”Just do it” as the advertisers entice-well, okay, I’ll do it, if you’ll only tell me how!  Still waiting…

Topics and ideas come and go, and I am a jack of all, master of none-which I must finally reluctantly admit and embrace.  So dear ones, if you are still with me by now, you may by now see that all this is a  pep talk to myself that I have oh, so sorely needed.  I thank you for sticking with me through the lean times, you’re the best.

My Trip to the Sheriff’s Substation

Bishop can be an interesting place to live…let me illustrate. Well, first, everything is ok. I went to the police station today voluntarily, not in cufffs or in the back of a squad car. But anyway, this is how the whole thing came to pass…
At the beginning of April 2009, I was a government employee, determined to hang on to a position with the Department of Commerce that was already obsolete!
I was one of the relatively few people across the nation chosen to help begin the work of the 2010 Census. In the spring of this year, then, the Census Bureau hired people to initiate mapping of neighborhoods for structural and other data.
This phase of the census was completed very quickly and the memory of my $15/hr job was only that. I needed to work; we were having a rough time of it with my husband’s pay being our only source of income.
On my very last day of canvassing, I went into the local grocery store to get some water, and while gulping it down, I spotted an ad on the store’s bulletin board that caught my eye. On a small slip of paper was some information about a job at a substantial rate of pay. I removed the paper and left for home, called the employer and went to work in a week.
I was to read a table of contents for the writer of magazine articles. This job entailed my going to work at the home of my boss for 2 hours at a time, which I did. This was not a problem, though I am not in the habit of going into stranger’s homes for money.
As I said previously, we needed the money and my job with the government had just come to an end. I arrived, ready for work, at the address he gave me and waited for him to find me and show me where he worked and lived.
His double-wide trailer was nice and I was invited in. I must say that I was not altogether comfortable standing in his living room, but I managed. He asked if I wanted to sit, which I did, groaning with the hip pain I was becoming accustomed to.
He asked if I was comfortable and did I need anything? I replied “No thanks, Don, I’m fine, it’s just that my hip is killing me so I need to ask you, umm, do you mind leaving the door open while I am here?” and he just smiled, Don did, as he complied…The door remained open for the 2 hours I spent working there and I was grateful that I had the courage to even mention it. My most pressing problem was that I needed to be able to flee if need be with the least amount of effort since my hip was shot. He didn’t mind. Thank God.
Don sat in an overstuffed chair near but not uncomfortably near my own.
We discussed the job, our families and the weather as people tend to do, then he spoke only of the job itself.
He handed me a couple of sheets of paper with a table of contents on one of these papers. The table had been written by him and he wanted to pay me to read it silently and then report to him whether or not it could be rewritten so as to appeal and not offend a Cosmopolitan audience.
Don had written this table of contents with Playgirl readers in mind who enjoyed sexually explicit and titillating writing in contrast perhaps to a Cosmo reader who may or may not enjoy such a reading experience.
Playgirl had gone out of business recently and from what I understand, Don had been left holding the table of contents.
I was to rate the table by how easily I thought that Don could translate the language he used, “Cunt”, “Cock”, “Pubes”, “Clit” and etcetera to Cosmo language like “Vagina”, “Penis”, “Pubic Hair” and “Clitoris” are some of the examples.
So. I understood my job and was ready to get on with it. I checked out my inner comfort level and was not surprised to find it wanting, yet again, we needed the money and I sensed no actual danger.
The guy was apparently harmless. At least physically harmless.
And so Don left the room and I began to read, ready to rate what he had written. I was pretty much mortified, folks, definitely disgusted. “Yuck” would fit right about here. “EEeeww” would work even better.
The words were not terribly offensive to me in and of themselves, I am in no way a prude. But I was beginning to sense that something else was going on besides my job.
Where had Don gone to wait while I read? Why had he left the room at all? I thought he had given me space but then I wasn’t so sure. He was quite prompt when I called to him, “Don?” when I was done.
I finished my 2 hours and did not allow myself to think about the job until I was in my truck bound for home.
I believe that was a self-protective decision, not to think about it until I was absolutely safe.
Once in my safe truck and on my way home I thought to myself, why did he leave the room? Why did he choose me to do this job, and why did he offer to pay me more money if I would let him practice his massage on me that day?
Now, with hindsight fully operational, I am fairly certain that he was masturbating in another room while I read his writing. I don’t know this, though. I must be sure that I leave the correct impression here. Don did not touch me in any way. He suggested I let him massage me but did not force the issue. Not at all.
So I decided to go to the Sheriff’s substation only because of a small slip of paper. It was placed withing reach of children. They would not have the confidence to resist money so easily.
They would be seduced/lured with ease.
And that, dear readers, is why I went to the Sheriff’s substation and told a Sargent this story. The Sargent was not pleased when he found that these slips of paper were appearing all over town as fast as they were removed. And neither was I.
The moral of the story? Be careful when broke. Don’t think you can’t live without money. Someone will give you enough money to eat or find shelter, you don’t have to read disgusting material for $15 an hour. Don’t let your child grab anything off a community bulletin board no matter what…
Ever.

Ahh, why not?

Privacy must exist somewhere, somehow. I can’t seem to find it and am making horrid blunders. I suppose I should be shot.
See Ya.